November DVD rentals, Part 2
Dec. 6th, 2018 01:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stdesjardinsWho the Hell's Bonnie and Clyde? is a Hungarian drama based on the memoir of real-life bank robber Tünde Novák. (The title comes from the girl's reaction to seeing a newspaper article calling them "the Miskolci Bonnie and Clyde", which is also the Hungarian-language title; presumably they changed it because few people outside Hungary know where or what Miskolc is.) At first, I thought the ending was a bit abrupt and confusing, but then I worked out that the DVD glitched at a particular point in the movie, and as soon as I skipped past that it was fine. It's as much a story about the controlling relationship between a teenager and her older boyfriend (just to be clear, she's the one in charge) as it is a crime movie, and the suspense of their efforts to stay ahead of the law is well handled. Recommended.
The Court of Last Resort contains four episodes from a 1957 television series, dramatizing the work of the real-life organization founded by Erle Stanley Gardner which worked to improve the administration of justice, primarily by investigating cases of those wrongly convicted or imprisoned. I was pleased to see that two of the cases involved efforts by the Court of Last Resort to obtain pardons for prisoners who they felt had successfully rehabilitated themselves. (In one of those cases, they actually found evidence of innocence, but the other case involved a prisoner who was unquestionably guilty of a brutal crime.) On the whole, I felt this was a case where dramatized recreations were less effective than a documentary approach would have been, and a good nonfiction book treatment would probably be superior to a filmed documentary. Flawed, but a worthy project and I'm glad to have seen it.
I had never seen Brave, and while it's worth familiarizing myself with major cultural touchstones, I couldn't help noticing that the four screenwriters and directors on the commentary track were all men. This basically earned a "Meh, I guess that was okay" from me.
Dheepan, which I watched in December but received in November, is the story about a refugee family who aren't really a family; they're three unrelated Sri Lankans who buy the passports of dead people and have to pretend to be a family to get asylum in France. It's a story about assimilating into a new life, and about resisting assimilation, filmed with non-professional actors who give amazing, compelling performances. It was originally conceived as a thriller, but in the course of making it the screenwriter and the director dropped most of the thriller elements, focusing on the quieter domestic drama. A smart choice; it would have been even smarter if they'd gone further and eliminated the remaining thriller elements, which include an over-the-top violent finale, but it's still a masterpiece. Highly recommended. (I had, as it turned out, seen it already, but not recognized it from the brief description. It's worth re-watching, and the commentary track was good, so I don't mind.)
The Court of Last Resort contains four episodes from a 1957 television series, dramatizing the work of the real-life organization founded by Erle Stanley Gardner which worked to improve the administration of justice, primarily by investigating cases of those wrongly convicted or imprisoned. I was pleased to see that two of the cases involved efforts by the Court of Last Resort to obtain pardons for prisoners who they felt had successfully rehabilitated themselves. (In one of those cases, they actually found evidence of innocence, but the other case involved a prisoner who was unquestionably guilty of a brutal crime.) On the whole, I felt this was a case where dramatized recreations were less effective than a documentary approach would have been, and a good nonfiction book treatment would probably be superior to a filmed documentary. Flawed, but a worthy project and I'm glad to have seen it.
I had never seen Brave, and while it's worth familiarizing myself with major cultural touchstones, I couldn't help noticing that the four screenwriters and directors on the commentary track were all men. This basically earned a "Meh, I guess that was okay" from me.
Dheepan, which I watched in December but received in November, is the story about a refugee family who aren't really a family; they're three unrelated Sri Lankans who buy the passports of dead people and have to pretend to be a family to get asylum in France. It's a story about assimilating into a new life, and about resisting assimilation, filmed with non-professional actors who give amazing, compelling performances. It was originally conceived as a thriller, but in the course of making it the screenwriter and the director dropped most of the thriller elements, focusing on the quieter domestic drama. A smart choice; it would have been even smarter if they'd gone further and eliminated the remaining thriller elements, which include an over-the-top violent finale, but it's still a masterpiece. Highly recommended. (I had, as it turned out, seen it already, but not recognized it from the brief description. It's worth re-watching, and the commentary track was good, so I don't mind.)
